Alabama Dinner at the Fat Ham
3131 Walnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104
When
Kevin Sbraga was traveling to do research for the Fat Ham with his team, they
were posting videos of their Southern road trip. They seemed to be having a
great time, and they were definitely eating really well, so when I heard that
they were inviting two chefs from Alabama up to cook for a night at the Fat
Ham, I grabbed a couple tickets and invited a friend to come with me and my
fiancé. We also had the pleasure of sharing the meal with the sommelier of the
Central Kitchen Sam Fonte. We talked a lot that night, and it was a pleasure
sharing that meal with him. All evening they were serving alcoholic sweet tea
and lemonades in true southern fashion. It made me very nostalgic for my time
at Elon.
The
menu for the evening looked amazing. It was a four course dinner that really
was an eight course dinner, because you got two different dishes at every
course. First course from Chef Leonardo Maurelli of Central Kitchen in Alabama
were marinated blue crab claws with Alabama corn and heirloom tomato and hominy
fritters with cotija cheese tostones, pork jowl bacon and sofrito. While I
enjoyed the crab claws, I found myself getting frustrated with them after a
while because you do so much work to get the tiniest amount of meat out of
them. They flavor was great, and I especially liked the corn and tomato with
it. The pork jowl dish was out of this world. It was one of most delicious
pieces of meat I have ever had. It was like bacon kicked up to another level.
It was smoky and fatty, meaty and delicious with a slight hint of sweetness to
go with the crispy char on its edges. It was outstanding. I am always a sucker
for tostones and although hominy fritters are new to me, they are welcome on my
plate at any time.
Our
second course was offerings from Chef de Cuisine of the Fat Ham Aaron
Gottesman. While I was not expecting to get a pasta course from him in a
southern themed dinner, that was exactly what we got. Black pepper papardelle
with rabbit confit, fava beans and locatelli cheese made for one hell of a
dish. Southern or not, that dish was just damn tasty. It was creamy, yet light,
and the rabbit added a great heartiness to the dish as well. I wasn’t as crazy
about the salad course he served us however. While it wasn’t bad by any means,
I just didn’t think it was all that good. The pig ear was great, it was super
crispy, but it was tough to chew and cut. I didn’t get much dressing on mine at
all, so maybe that is why I thought it wasn’t that great. It was supposed to come
with fig vinaigrette and sunflower seeds, but they were pretty sparse.
Third
courses came out next from chef Rob McDaniel, and there were two of the best of
the evening. First up was a slow roasted porchetta with crispy skin and a field
pea and cherry tomato salad that was out of this world. The pork had been
roasted for so long that it might as well have just dissolved when you put it
in your mouth. It was so succulent and tender, I could have eaten mountains of
it, and my god that skin. Crispy, crackly and salty beyond imagination, it was
an amazing amount of flavor and texture to go with the pork. The second part of
his course was the poached Louisiana gulf shrimp with gribiche and jumbo
asparagus. The shrimp were cooked every so lightly and intensely flavored with
the gribiche. The asparagus while humongous were also cooked perfectly and left
very tender. I was so full at this point, they could have already rolled me out
of there.
Kevin
Sbraga finished us off strong that evening with a buttermilk chess pie with
lemon Chantilly cream and fried rosemary and a blackberry cobbler with goat
cheese sorbet. I never knew Chef Sbraga has such a deft hand with desserts, but
there were two pretty fantastic desserts. I had never even heard of buttermilk
chess pie during my time in the South, and after tasting it, I was super
disappointed that I didn’t know about it while I was there. It was amazing!
It’s a custard based pie that gets browned on top and is incredibly rich. It
tasted like the South in each and every bite. Cobbler of any kind immediately
makes me think of the South, and this particular blackberry one was spot on.
The one difference with this was the goat cheese sorbet. It was supremely
different than traditional vanilla ice cream that you usually get with
cobblers, so it actually kept it light and fresh all the way through because of
the tanginess of the goat cheese that made it feel much more savory than sweet.
If
you haven’t been to the Fat Ham before, you may not know how charming this
little restaurant is. It is even more charming when you have the whole place
filled with awesome chefs that really know what they are doing and are just
having an awesome time together. I loved checking out the Alabama dinner they
hosted, and I encourage you to keep an eye out for similar events held there
going forward! Cheers!
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